Anywhere north of Watford Gap is the North, so far as media is concerned. Always has been. Stoke, so far as the media is concerned, is not even barely still in the Midlands. The BBC moving to Salford was like going to the Arctic.
Might be true - is there an actual source of data available? The media/press ONLY report those who get asked to travel a long way, completely ignoring the many thousands who do not. And those who cannot travel to a centre can and do opt for a postal service. So the average may well be low, the median might be rather different.... And furthermore there is a distinction to be made between the distance people are asked to travel and the distance they actually travel.
Of course there are some 'problems' with testing, but the average distance actually travelled is likely quite reasonable, and many, many get postal tests sent.
Student housemate of my daughter is just an example only yesterday. Through contact tracing from a pub visit in Sussex last week (tracing does exist it seems!) she has been advised to get tested. In the meantime she had relocated to her term time student house in Birmingham. The local University has a test centre on site, only a few hundred metres away (that can bring down an average!, a lot), but it was very busy for appointments so she opted for a postal service. Arrived the next morning. If she is positive, my daughter is going to delay her own return to the house - she had been planning to get some stuff over there in the next couple of days, ahead of a full move on the 20th. Now if there is a positive result, the 4 who are already in residence at the house will be isolating. Other contacts back in Sussex, traced to the same pub, have come back negative, so fingers are crossed.
Meanwhile my other daughter heads up to her house in Liverpool tomorrow. I am taking the day off to do the job. Seems early - but the housemates will get a chance to bubble up before term starts. They have a small birthday party organised which will just get through before the new rules come in on Monday.
Meanwhile the new rules announced last night have completely bashed my plans for a socially distanced small outdoor party for my wife on her 60th. She is very cross, but nothing we can do but cancel. If it was a small wedding - we could apparently still do it.
So far this year Covid has wrecked... A booked weekend at Blenheim Palace, A booked family holiday to Portugal, a booked family wedding, our 25th Wedding Anniversary (Party and New York trip), a close friends 25th wedding party, oldest daughters Graduation, wife's 60th, three other 60th parties of family and friends, the student kids summer trips to Zante, Ibiza and Spain and several other minor dos as well.
